Reply to Looking back, do you wish your child attended the least expensive college?

Forum Index » College and University Discussion

Reply to "Looking back, do you wish your child attended the least expensive college?"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Words from my 26 yr old niece who ended up at an instate due to cost over a private LAC where she would've had to take out a loan even though she *really* did not want to go to instate. She got a great job out of college, now close to making six figures.

"I'm so glad I went with in state and didn't have a loan. I see all my friends who went to more expensive schools struggling to pay their loans, some moving in with their parents.  I have enough saved now to buy a small condo."

My niece spoke to my soon to be college freshman about college costs and loans.  She convinced my DC to take the good in state option, and save your money.[/quote]

THIS is awesome. Sounds like a great kid passing on good advice!

We have always told our kids that we have a budget and we will not sign for any loans over it (if they felt strongly it would be their option to do so). Their grandparents have contributed to their college savings in addition to our contributions which has given them enough for most in-state schools so they are very fortunate. #1 DC is at an OOS private school within budget with no regrets (got in to more and less expensive and chosen school was in the middle). #2 DC is narrowing down options - 4 remain with one over budget school to discuss but probably will get dropped by child, again it is DC decision.[/quote]

Good plan.  Going into major debt is not smart.  However, your kid can only take $5.5K in loans per year.  Anything more would have to be parent loans (or grandparent loans)---kids cannot get them themselves
[/quote]

It’s $5.5k for freshmen, $6.5k each for sophomores and juniors, and $7.5k for seniors.[/quote]

OP here. This is new and helpful info for me, thank you. So basically if he wanted to attend a school over what we were willing to pay, I could tell him he would only be approved for the amounts above? Is this some sort of standard amount banks approve? I want to make sure I am correct in my info before going to him.[/quote]

Those are the maximum amounts of federal student loans that dependent (students who aren’t older than 24, orphaned, parenting, married and/or military members) students can borrow per-year in their own name without needing a co-signer. Students don’t need any financial need to borrow the $27k in unsubsidized loans. Unsubsidized would generally mean interest accrues during school. Students with financial need get a portion of that $27k to not accrue interest during school. The interest, in that case, is subsidized. You would need to fill out the FAFSA yearly for your child to get these. Your child can accept or decline them each semester, however, they don’t “roll over” to the next year. For example, if you decline the $5500 loan for freshmen year, your child still can’t take out more than $6500 for sophomore year. The ability to take out the $5500 is gone at that point. But they could still take out the $6500 that sophomores get, for sophomore year.

Here is the DOE website on it: https://studentaid.gov/understand-aid/types/loans

Would highly recommend avoiding Parent Plus Loans, 401k loans, HELOC loans or private bank loans (i.e. Discover Student Loans). Families do take those out, and that’s where the “$100k in student debt for undergrad” horror stories come from. But I don’t think $20k or $27k in student debt is a big deal for most degrees, especially if it’s one of the only ways a student can attend college.
[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics